“When are we going to get a half-decent break?” I asked him.
Potter looked at me and blew a lungful of smoke into the air.
“We’re running around in circles,” I said, more to myself than him.
“Something will turn up,” he said, leaning against the side of the car and enjoying his smoke.
“And what if it doesn’t?” I snapped, sounding more frustrated than cross. “Kayla is inside that school, werewolves are free to take children at will, we’ve got a young woman who has suddenly vanished or worse, and the local cop couldn’t give a crap because he’s too busy screwing the local Seven-Eleven for a discount!”
Potter didn’t say anything back, he just puffed on the cigarette and squirted jets of smoke out through his nostrils. When he had finished, he flicked the cigarette into the gutter and got into the car. I climbed in next to him, feeling more frustrated than ever. Potter started the engine and it spluttered and wheezed to life.
“We need some petrol. We’re nearly empty,” he said.
On the other side of the road, there was a small petrol station with two pumps on the tiny forecourt. “Over there,” I said, jabbing my finger in the direction of the petrol station.
Potter swung the car out of the car park and crossed the road to the petrol station which stood opposite the Seven-Eleven. He drew level with a pump, got out, and began to fill the tank. I watched him through the car window, and it was then that I saw it. There was a CCTV camera attached to the underside of the petrol station canopy facing out across the forecourt.
While Potter finished filling the tank, I climbed from the car and walked over to where the camera was fixed. I looked up at it and studied the position it was facing. I turned my back to face it and looked out at the view that the camera had. I could see the whole of the forecourt and beyond, where to my delight, across the street was the entrance to the Seven-Eleven.
“I wonder?” I whispered. “I wonder?”
Chapter Twenty-Five
We went into the kiosk and Potter paid for the petrol in full from my savings. I didn’t show my badge before the petrol had been paid for, as I wasn’t sure if this was something else Banner and his merry men expected discount on. The girl behind the counter was chewing obnoxiously on a piece of gum. I showed her my badge. She raised her eyebrows as if to say ‘What now?’ and then said, “What can I do you for?”
“I’m investigating a missing person enquiry and I was wondering if I could view your CCTV footage for yesterday.”
“How’s that?” she mumbled, removing the gum from her front teeth with her tongue.
“How’s what?” Potter glared at her.
“Why do you want to watch the CCTV?” she asked him.
“Because we’ve had information that she may have been in the area yesterday, so we need to check it out,” he said bluntly.
“What, she came in here did she?” the girl asked.
Potter sighed and managed a false smile as if he was fast losing his patience. “I don’t know. That’s why we need to view the CCTV.”
She eyed us momentarily and blew a large pink bubble from between her lips. It popped and she sucked it back into her mouth.
“Sure, it’s all in the back,” and she nodded towards a door that had PRIVATE — STAFF ONLY written across it.
“Thank you,” I smiled and headed towards the door.
The backroom was poky and smelt strongly of stale tobacco smoke. There was a table and a rubbish bin that was overflowing with empty cans of Coke and cheeseburger wrappers. The table was littered with crumpled magazines and newspapers. Fixed to the wall was a TV monitor which showed the gas station forecourt. I watched it and could see a car pulling in. In the distance, I could see across the street and customers entering the Seven-Eleven. It wasn’t the clearest picture in the world but it would do. I guessed that if Emily Clarke was in that store yesterday, I would be able to make her out on the footage. After all, she looked just like her sister, Elizabeth. On the wall beside the monitor was a shelf which housed a bunch of discs in plastic CD cases. I ran my fingers along their spines and stopped when I had found the previous day’s disc. I plucked it from the shelf and placed it into the DVD player beneath the TV.
The monitor went blank then flickered into life and once again I was viewing the gas station forecourt from the previous day. It was like going back in time. In the right-hand corner of the screen flashed yesterday’s date and time. It read 07:13 hrs. I held my finger down on the fast-forward button and whizzed through the next few hours of footage. Banner had told me that Emily’s credit card had been used in the Seven-Eleven store at 10:30 am, so I let the DVD run at normal speed from 10:25 am just to make sure and take into account any timing discrepancies.
We stood in the staffroom and glanced anxiously up at the screen, both hoping that we would see Emily. The clock on the film ticked round to 10:30 am and we still hadn’t seen her.
“Come on,” I breathed, hoping for just one break.
“Take it easy, tiger,” Potter said, sensing how anxious I was becoming.
By 10:31 am there was still no sign of her. The minutes seemed to take an eternity to pass. Now 10:32 am — nothing. Then, as the clock turned to 10:33 am on the screen, I saw something. I quickly pressed the pause button and the image froze. I moved closer to the screen until my nose was almost pressed against it and I screwed up my eyes and stared at the screen. I didn’t recognise the person leaving the store a few moments after Emily’s credit card had been used but it definitely wasn’t Emily Clarke. Even through the grainy black and white image on the screen I could see that it was a man. He was tall, with black, swept back hair, wearing a black suit.
“Who do you think that is?” Potter asked me.
I had never seen McCain, but from the grainy picture on the screen, the image of the man looked just how Elizabeth Clarke had described him.
“McCain,” I said, unable to take my eyes from the TV.
“How can you be so sure?” Potter asked, peering over my shoulder.
“I can’t,” I told him, taking the disc from the DVD player. “Let’s just hope that Isidor has done his homework in researching this McCain.”
“Let’s hope,” Potter said, sounding unconvinced.
“But one thing’s for sure,” I said, looking at him. “Emily Clarke didn’t use her credit card yesterday. So where is she now?”
“Beats the shit out of me,” Potter said, heading back through the kiosk.
“Did you find what you were looking for?” the girl with the gum called out as we headed out of the door.
“Maybe,” I smiled, leaving the kiosk.
Chapter Twenty-Six
We waited for lights-out, and for the school to fall into silence before we dared leave our rooms. With his head bent low, and crouched over like a crab, Sam made his way down the narrow staircase at the end of the corridor. I followed him down the spiral stairwell and into the bowels of Ravenwood. The school was in darkness, and I felt my way down the staircase by brushing the tips of my fingers against the stone wall, listening to the snap-snap sound of Sam’s shoes ahead of me. Reaching the ground floor, Sam crept through the passageways which stretched throughout Ravenwood. I followed.
Ahead, oblong shards of moonlight fell through the corridor windows and lit our way. I could hear the sound of Sam’s racing heart and it was almost deafening in the desolate corridors. My stomach tightened and I felt sick. Back in my bedroom, the idea of searching out Emily Clarke’s bedroom seemed exciting, but Sam hadn’t mentioned anything about how creepy the school was during the night and in the dark. Every shadow we passed I eyed with dread, fearing that a Grey would appear from within the gloom and come racing towards me, sizzle-stick in hand, its end pulsating with shocks of electric blue light.